First of all, hi everyone. While I've been browsing these forums for a little while, it is the first time I actually post something.

I'm currently playing my second bob/angel run, and this time I decided to try myself a bit more on the rail system.
Now, considering the huuuge variety of wares that will be shuffled on my tracks, I want to alleviate the use of the system as much as possible.

My solution so far is to disable any stations with insufficient material to load up a train to the desired amount, as well as stations with insufficient room to receive a full load of wares. So far so good, but I do see a problem coming up. Say a train is stuck at a receiving station because it has no loading stations to go to. Then said train will block up the station for any other trains that would want to come and deliver their wares.

So I want to make a general "stacker station", to which any trains without orders would go to until called with their respective orders. Simple enough to build, but I do see a potential problem coming up: If I set the stacker station in the train's order queue, it will go there to make a pit stop whether or not there's a loading or unloading station to accommodate it.

So how do I make it so the trains would go to that station only if it has nowhere else to go?

Might want to give Train Supply Manager mod a try. For example, in my smelter, I have it setup with a "holding stacker" such that a train is waiting with a full load of ore in the stacker. When a station is low on ore a train is called from that holding station. Once it unloads completely the train heads to the ore pickup, fills up and returns to wait at the stacker until another station needs it. This way there is a ready supply of ore nearby, instead of a system like Logistic Train Network that would call an empty train from a depot send it to pickup ore, then go to the requesting station. Either will work depending on your specific setup, but one may be better depending on distances, buffer capacity, train traffic, etc.